tuck my knife into his back where I thought it would
kill him at once. But it didn't, Baas, for he fell on to his face and
began to make a noise like a wounded hyena before I could finish him.
Then I heard a sound of shouts, and to save my life was obliged to run
away into the mist, without loosing Red-Beard or seeing Lady Sad-Eyes.
I ran very hard, Baas, making a wide circle to the left, and so at last
got back here. That's all, Baas."

"And quite enough, too," I answered, "though if they did not see you,
the death of the Medicine-man may frighten them. Poor Janee! Well, I
hope to come even with those devils before they are three hours older."

Then I called up Umslopogaas and the Amahagger captains and told them
the substance of the story, also that Hans had located the army, or part
of it.

The end of it was that we made up our minds to attack at once; indeed
I insisted on this, as I was determined if I could to save that
unfortunate man, Robertson, who, from Hans' account, evidently was now
quite mad and raving. So I fired the two shots as had been arranged
and presently heard the sound of distant shoutings on the slope of
the opposing ridge. A few minutes later we started, Umslopogaas and I
leading the vanguard and the Amahagger captains following with the three
remaining companies.

Now the reader, presuming the existence of such a person, will think
that everything is sure to go right; that this cunning old fellow, Allan
Quatermain, is going to surprise and wipe the floor with those Rezuites,
who were already beguiled by the trick he had instructed Goroko to play.
That after this he will rescue Robertson who doubtless shortly recovers
his mind, also Inez with the greatest ease, in fact that everything will
happen as it ought to do if this were a romance instead of a mere record
of remarkable facts. But being the latter, as it happened, matters did
not work out quite in this convenient way.

To begin with, when those Amahagger told me that the Rezuites never
fought in the dark or before the sun was well up, either they lied or
they were much mistaken, for at any rate on this occasion they did the
exact contrary. All the while that we thought we were stalking them,
they were stalking us. The Goroko manoeuvre had not deceived them in the
least, since from their spies they knew its exact significance.

Here, I may add that those spies were in our own ranks, traitors, in
short, who were really in the pay of Rezu